Tuesday, April 20, 2010

In Season NW: Market News

The national press has been all over our market scene, with the Portland Farmers' Market at PSU voted the second best market in the country (after Seattle and ahead of New Orleans) in a recent survey of readers of Travel & Leisure magazine. With the recent expansion of the market to include the block immediately to the south and with two dozen new vendors, market manager Ann Forsthoefel said that attendance is already nearly double over what it was last year. That means happy shoppers with more elbow room and, it follows, happy vendors, too.

Details: Portland Farmers' Market at PSU. Sat., 8:30 am-2 pm. At Portland State University in the South Park Blocks between SW Hall & SW Montgomery.

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Portland Examiner.com columnist Sandy McCollum made a trip to the Lloyd Farmers' Market and found herself dazed by the warm, homemade breads, wild mushrooms and fresh asparagus she found there. Needless to say, she stumbled out an hour later loaded down with goodies to take home, a common situation for almost every market shopper I know. Maybe we should start a Portland chapter of MSA…Market Shoppers Anonymous? View a slideshow of this hidden gem of a market.

For some reason the fact that we have a terrific roster of winter markets here in Portland simply doesn't register with some people, though they may be dedicated, even rabid, market shoppers during the rest of the year. That list includes the Hillsdale Farmers' Market, People's Farmers' Market and the Lloyd Farmers' Market, soon to be joined by a year-round market in Oregon City. So it was great to see one of my favorite markets celebrated in a story at Zester Daily on the Hillsdale market and one of its founders, Ted J. Coonfield. Way to go, Hillsdale!

Details: Hillsdale Farmers' Market. Sun., 10 am-2 pm. At the intersection of SW Capitol Hwy and Sunset Blvd. in the parking lot of Wilson High School behind the Hillsdale Shopping Center.